“I just made the news. Can’t really say what I did.”
That note was written on April 15, 2023 by Jamal Jackson, who is accused of killing two people and trying to kill two others as he saw men painting over his gang graffiti, a prosecutor told the jury in opening statements at Jackson’s trial on Friday, March 7.
Jackson, 26, of Panorama City, is charged with murder and attempted murder in shootings by the wall of an ice cream shop in Northridge, where he painted the graffiti. “He intended to kill these targets and then he boasted about it,” said Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney Nicholas Kang.
In his opening statement, Jackson’s defense lawyer said his client did not intend to kill the men he shot. He mistook them for rival gang members, Ilya Alekseyeff, the attorney, said.
He is contesting the attempted murder and first-degree murder charges. What Jackson has admitted to would be second-degree murder, Alekseyeff said on Saturday, and he said lesser charges than attempted murder would be appropriate for the injuries.
The shooting happened on April 15, 2023. At 6 a.m. that day, Jackson left a gang graffiti tag outside a Northridge ice cream shop at 19105 Parthenia Street, police said. It was in an area claimed by a rival gang.
Jackson, then 24 years old, returned to the area around 12:30 p.m. and shot at a group of people outside the ice cream shop, two of whom were hired to paint over graffiti, including the gang tag left hours earlier by Jackson.
Juan Lopez-Suarez, 39, one of the men hired to paint the wall, was shot and died later that day at a hospital. Benjamin Marin, 69, was also shot, and died months later. He was a bystander. At least two others were injured. None of the victims had any affiliation to gangs.
Jackson was arrested in Ontario the next day.
In court, LAPD detective Christopher Bolan testified that the ice cream shop is located in an area claimed by a gang that rivals the one Jackson is associated with.
A rival gang tagging over another gang’s graffiti in their territorial area, he said, is a “very big sign of disrespect.”
Kang played surveillance videos of the shooting. A few spectators in the gallery let out soft cries. They cried again when Kang displayed photographs of the bodies of the two men who were killed.
The evidence would show Jackson was being deliberate, Kang said. It would show how long it took him to walk over before opening fire, that he shot 12 rounds, and that his shooting stance was tactical. Kang also noted that Jackson continued shooting while taking steps back before returning to his car across the street.
Kang said later that day, Jackson wrote a note saying, “I just made the news. Can’t really say what I did.” The note was recovered via a search warrant, the prosecutor said.
Alekseyeff said the jury will hear that eight months before the April 2023 shooting, Jackson was himself injured in a shootout. Jackson mistook the people he shot at the ice cream shop for rival gang members, the lawyer said.
Jackson’s plan was not to kill anyone, Alekseyeff said, but to “make people who shot him prior to suffer like he had.”
“This case is about why … why did this shooting happen,” Alekseyeff said.
Victor Gomez was one of the men hired to paint the wall outside the ice cream shop the day of the shooting. Gomez, who was not struck by the gunfire, testified that he grew up locally and knew it as a gang area.
A construction worker, Gomez said he went inside the ice cream shop to offer his services to paint over the graffiti tags. He and another man, who Gomez said had just arrived from Nicaragua, were hired and paid $100 each for the job.
Gomez got choked up after Kang played video surveillance footage from the shooting.
As he was preparing to paint, he told the jury, he heard bullets fly over his head and gunshots hitting the wall. He said he instinctually ran when the shots rang out.
“It was so quick, it was like a movie,” Gomez said. “As soon as I heard gunshots, I saw his body fall,” he said of the man from Nicaragua, who was killed.
Another witness, Francisco Yacuta Leon, couldn’t escape the bullets.
Leon testified that he was hanging out with friends drinking a beer near where the tagged wall was about to be painted.
Before the shooting, he said, he heard someone warn him about the man, Jackson, approaching the group. He said he saw Jackson pointing a gun at him and the group of men he was with.
Leon said a bullet entered his abdomen and exited the top of his left shoulder. He recalled that it burned.
The trial is expected to resume next week.